Flexera Software Announces InstallShield 2012 Spring, Further Enabling Desktop Transformations

SCHAUMBURG, IL -- (Marketwire) -- 05/10/12 -- Flexera Software, the leading provider of Application Usage Management solutions for application producers and enterprises, announced today the launch of InstallShield 2012 Spring. InstallShield is the global de facto installation development solution on more than 500 million PCs, supporting traditional and agile development teams with their Windows, cloud and virtualization installation requirements.

"Enterprises are in the midst of significant transformation -- the consumerization of IT, virtualization and the cloud to name a few examples," said Maureen Polte, Vice President of Product Management at Flexera Software. "This creates new opportunities for software producers able to deliver next-generation solutions while creating an exceptional experience -- starting with software installation. InstallShield 2012 Spring demonstrates Flexera Software's leadership in the installation management space as an enabler to desktop transformations and the cloud."

Helping Software Producers Deliver Desktop Transformation

The rapidly changing technology marketplace favors software producers that can adapt quickly, go to market faster, and create an exceptional customer experience consistent with a "there's an app for that" mindset. InstallShield 2012 Spring empowers software producers with support for emerging technologies using traditional and agile development processes. For instance, as the cloud transforms enterprise application strategies, software producers must support database access for their products both on-premises and in hybrid cloud environments. InstallShield 2012 Spring offers new Microsoft SQL Azure database scripting capabilities enabling software producers to support hybrid cloud deployments of their applications.

"SQL Azure is a highly available and scalable cloud database service, built on SQL Server technologies, that makes it easy for enterprises to extend solutions to the cloud without having to migrate all of their data or existing enterprise datacenter applications at once," said Gregory Leake, Director, Product Marketing at Microsoft. "InstallShield 2012 Spring's support of SQL Azure database scripting is critical to software producers that want to facilitate their customers' application migrations to hybrid cloud environments."

"Our enterprise customers are interested in adopting hybrid on-premise/cloud solutions that help in their transition to the cloud," said Mikhail Dikov, Principal Software Engineer, Open Text. "InstallShield 2012 Spring's support of SQL Azure helps ensure we can deliver a first-rate installation experience in traditional, on-premise as well as hybrid cloud environments."

Moreover, Microsoft's upcoming releases of Windows 8, Windows Server 2012 and Visual Studio 11 signal a major acceleration towards user-centric computing and the consumerization of IT. Leading software producers will want to ensure ahead of time that their solutions will work in those environments with a positive installation experience. InstallShield 2012 Spring now provides a specification that an installation requires Windows 8 or Windows Server 2012, and lets software producers build feature and component conditions for these operating systems.

"Enterprises are in the throes of their Windows 7 migrations, and are beginning to explore Windows 8," said Polte. "InstallShield 2012 Spring's support of these environments provides essential tools to facilitate a smooth migration and positive installation experience to Windows 8."

Finally, as enterprises migrate to Microsoft System Center 2012 and user-centric computing, they need accurate deployment metadata to populate Microsoft's new App Model. InstallShield 2012 Spring enables software producers to provide this metadata to their enterprise customers, reducing the burden in managing those applications.

Enhancing Customer Loyalty via Improved End User Experience